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Shadow Lord
Malverlain, better known as the Shadow Lord, was the son of Chieftain Peregrine and the Fellan, Alenan and the brother of Anoltis and Eldannen. Originally born in Nerra, in Dorne, he was banished and, upon finding the Land of Dragons, set to conquer it. Choosing to take over Pirra, he resides in what is now called the Shadowlands and constantly made plans to take over Deltora. History Early life Malverlain was born to Chieftain Peregrine and the Fellan Alenan (shortened to Alena), in Nerra, Dorne. Malverlain saw his older brother, Anoltis as his rival and his younger brother, Eldannen as nothing more He studied and read many books and was trained in sorcery. When Anoltis was sixteen, Alena died and was put to rest in Dann's Mirror, in the Fell Zone. Soon after, Peregrine passed away in his sleep and, knowing that Anoltis would be the favorite to become Chieftain, challenged his older brother. He believed it was his right to become Chieftain and that Anolts had stolen the throne from him. Using magic, Malverlain attacked Anoltis and Eldannen sided against him. After a long battle, Malverlain was defeated by his two brothers, for together they were almost invincible, and they decided his fate. Banishment from Dorne In secrecy, Anoltis and Eldannen (shortened to Olt and Dann) took Malverlain down to the shore underneath The Fortress. There, standing shoulder to shoulder, they held the banishment spell, pointing out to sea. Sick with rage and bitterness, Malverlain conjured up a boat with a grey sail marked with red and headed out to sea. The power of the banishment spell sped him on his way and as he cursed his two brothers, he vowed he would return and take vengeance. He turned and sailed west, for he knew that other islands lay that way, including the Land of Dragons. The four sisters In his search, he chanced upon a beautiful island that was home to four sisters: Flora, Viva, Aqua, and Terra. They were beautiful singers, but Malverlain, hating all beautiful things, and furious with what his siblings had done to him, imprisoned each on a separate corner of the island. However, the sisters still sang to one another from a long distance, and Malverlain still was not rid of the singing. Enraged, he hurried to each of the corners and struck them down, one by one. However, their singing had soothed and sealed a great beast in the center of the land; by killing them and silencing their singing, Malverlain had enraged and released the beast. Angered, it rose, crushing the beasts, smashing the mountains, and cracking the rock that the island rested on, so that it began to sink. Malverlain, not yet powerful enough to face the beast, fled out in the Silver Sea, conjuring up a small wooden boat with a grey sail, marked with red. Arrival at Deltora on his arrival at Deltora.]]One day, he washed ashore on Deltora, then known as the Land of Dragons. He landed on the northwest side, in the territory of the Amethyst. The Torans who inhabited that territory conjured a banishing spell against him, and Malverlain, still weak from his ventures at sea, was forced to use his magic to teleport himself away. He materialized in the territory of the Emerald, and immediately decided that this was the land that he wanted to rule. However, he was soon attacked and burned by an Emerald Dragon and fled to the mountain range, that seperated the Land of Dragons from Pirra. He hid there for many years, gathering followers in the many bandits and killers also living in the mountains. He forced them to spy on both the Land of Dragons and Pirra for any weaknesses he could exploit, and steadily worked to grow his powers. The birth of the Ak-Baba One day, on a snowy peak, he found what he thought at the time was a dragon egg. He was very pleased with his discovery, thinking that he could raise his own army of dragons to conquer Deltora. What he didn't know was dragon nests are always lined with human hair. When he brought it to his cave and the egg hatched, however, he realized that this was not a dragon; it was a kind of bird. Though disappointed and furious, he soon realized that this bird could be useful in its own way, and he presumably found 6 more eggs, resulting in what would eventually become his loyal group of Ak-Baba. The Shadowlands egg on top of a mountain in the Barrier Mountains, the Shadow Lord raised it himself.]]Later, when he was more powerful, Malverlain went to Pirra. He tricked the Pirrans into splitting both their people and, more importantly, their magic flute, known as the Pirran Pipe, into three parts. Without the Pirran Pipe, the land of Pirra lost its power and the Pirrans fled to a secret underground ocean beneath Deltora. Malverlain ruled the now-vacant Pirra, which became the Shadowlands, and he, himself, became the Shadow Lord as the people of Deltora know him. The Battle for Deltora The Shadow Lord then attempted to take over Deltora by himself. In the Shadowlands, he built a factory, in which he created fearsome beings, such as the Grey Guards and the Vraals, and with these, he formed what later became known as the Shadow Army. With his new army, the Shadow Lord greedly raid and plundered the land of Deltora, burning down towns, slaying the lands’ people. However, a blacksmith, Adin, during the Battle for Deltora, united the tribes of Deltora with the Belt of Deltora and drove the Shadow Lord's armies back to the Shadowlands. It became the custom for the heir of Deltora to always wear the Belt of Deltora; however, the royal family's advisors were slowly replaced with the Shadow Lord's servants in secret, and they made it the custom for the Belt of Deltora only to be worn on the day that the heir became king or queen. Eventually, the Shadow Lord succeeded in stealing the gems of the Belt of Deltora and scattering them throughout the land, and with the help of his seven Ak-Baka, he killed all but seven of Deltora's dragons – each of which was a member of all the land’s different species of dragons. Presumably, one hundred years before the time of King Lief, the sorceress Thaegan came to the Shadowlands after running away from her mother, who was upset with her daughter's fascination with dark magic. When she left, she decided to settle in Deltora, now more powerful than ever. The Stolen Gems Sixteen years later, Lief and his companions Barda and Jasmine collected the seven gems from the most feared places in the land: the Forests of Silence; the Lake of Tears; City of the Rats; the Shifting Sands; Dread Mountain; the Maze of the Beast and the Valley of the Lost. He then expelled the Shadow Lord from Deltora when he rearranged the Belt so the first letters of each gem spelt out "DELTORA" and put the Belt on, revealing himself to be the heir, and the last in Adin's bloodline. The Pirran Pipe After the newly crowned King Lief's victory, the Shadow Lord took the people of the town Noradz to the Shadowlands, only to brainwash them (by putting mind-control worms in them) and make them his loyal servants. Among these servants were the girl Tira, who had helped Lief, Barda and Jasmine escape her city on their first quest to retrieve the stolen gems. The new king Lief, and his friends, Barda and Jasmine, set off on a quest for the Pirrian Pipe, which was said to be the only weapon strong enough to defeat the Shadow Lord in his own domain. It was the Palace Librarian Josef, who had revealed the Pipe’s existence to them. Once they had got all three pieces of the Pipe from each of the secret underground islands, they traveled into the Shadowlands and let themselves be taken as prisoners. When arriving at the Shadow Arena, Lief withdrew the Pipe and blew in it, but he was unfortunately not skilled enough, so Lief offered the Pirran Emlis, who was with them at the time, the Pipe, and he played it, sending the Shadow Lord further in exile. This gave the heroes the opportunity to free all his slaves, and together they fled the Shadowlands. The Four Sisters Lief then learnt of the Four Sisters, four evil creatures which sing a poisonous song, making anything unable to grow in Deltora, therefore starving the people of Deltora. The Shadow Lord had planted them there a long time ago, in case everything else he had plotted would turn out wrong. He had based this last desperate plan on his encounter with four sisters on an island, which he had come to after fleeing from Dorne. His several plans were even referrered to as ’plans inside plans’ by Barda. Lief, Barda and Jasmine set out to awake the seven remaining dragons of Deltora, whose the famous traveler who lived long ago during the time of King Lucan, Doran the Dragonlover, had talked into falling into a deep magical slumber on his last journey, before being reported as missing, and even worse, dead. But in fact, he had become a guardian of one of the Four Sisters, the Sister of the West, which now lived inside him. So in order to for the Sister of the West to be killed, Doran had to be killed as well. On this last quest, Lief, Barda and Jasmine united each of the seven dragons with their counterpart gem, using four of the dragons’ help to destroy the Sisters, one by one. But the Shadow Lord had a very last plan with the Sisters, for if they were to be destroyed, a giant mass of grey slime, located in the heart of the land, in the City of the Rats, formerly known as Hira, would arise and cover Deltora in a hardening grey slime. When Lief did succeed in silencing the last of the Sisters, and the tide of grey slime rose, however with the help of Deltora's last dragons, whose secret names were revealed to be Veritas, Hopian, Fortuna, Fidelis, Forta, Honoura and Joyeau, stopped the tide from consuming the whole land. And so the Shadow Lord's plans were ended and Lief married Jasmine, who became queen of Deltora. But knowin that the Shadow Lord had been defeated, yet not killed, Lief still never removed the Belt. And he did remained in his domain, plotting. Attack on Dorne Some time after this, the Shadow Lord tried to invade Dorne. He sent a spy to advise the Chieftan there to attack the Fellan, for the Fellan protected the island from the Shadow Lord. Luckily for the people of Dorne, five heroes from Weld foiled the Shadow Lord's plans. Physical appearance On arrival at Deltora, Malverlain wore a large cloak of shadows and carried a magic staff made of a wooden branch, curled on top. The Shadow Lord, although once dark-skinned with red hair, over the years, anger and hatred completely consumed his physical body. Towards the end of Lief's journey to find the lost gems, the Shadow Lord appeared floating in the air, surrounded by dark red clouds. Anime In the anime, the Shadow Lord is depicted as a massive, demonic entity with glowing red eyes, a body made out of darkness and as having a deep sinister voice. Personality The Shadow Lord, after fleeing from Dorne, became very bitter and sick with greed. Desperate to rule, the Shadow Lord became a megalomaniac, willing to do anything to get his way. Hating everything good and beautiful, his soul is dark and filled with jealousy, of his brothers and of the people of Deltora, for his plans to overtake the island failed. Over the years, his hatred has grown and, to him, a thousand years is like the blink of an eye. Deriving pleasure from mentally tormenting Lief, he appears to be very sadistic and cruel, going by the policy that if he can not have something, he will simply destroy it, evident from deciding to destroy Deltora with the Grey Tide when his Four Sisters strategy failed. The Shadow Lord cares nothing about his subordinates, viewing them as simple pawns. An exception to this may be the Ak-Baba, if for their strength and loyalty if no other reason. Abilities Studying and reading into sorcery at a young age, Malverlain was a very powerful sorcerer. Strengthened by Fellan blood, he could perform killing spells and conjure objects. By the time of the series, the Shadow Lord's power had extended to being able to kill miles away from itself, and could share its power with others. It also possessed power over the weather, and was able to send a powerful wind to blow Lief and the Belt away from Deltora in Isle of the Dead. In'' Sister of the South'', the Shadow Lord used its power to defy the Belt of Deltora and sent the Ak-Baba to attack the dragons. This is an impressive feet itself, as the Belt is the very object preventing the Shadow Lord's invasion. The Shadow Lord is also a master engineer and biologist. Inside its Shadow Factory, it creates all forms of monsters and servants for its army. Many captured slaves are also experimented on, usually ending up as mindless and mishapened beasts. Also, in the alternate future seen in the Silver Door, he breeds Skimmers that can survive in daylight. Relationships Relatives Appearances Trivia *The Shadow Lord's true name was only revealed in the new edition of Tales of Deltora, and in The Three Doors series. *Because Rosalyn is from Deltora the Shadow Lord has Deltoran blood in him. He even has ancestors from the city of Del, the capital of Deltora. *The Shadow Lord is the main antagonist throughout all three Deltora Quest series. *The Shadow Lord's most loyal servants are the seven Ak-Baba. Notes References Category:Characters Category:Minor characters Category:Males Category:Magic users Category:Fellan Category:Part Fellan Category:People of Dorne Category:Antagonists